


The Renaissance Man

by meanderingmirth



Series: Five Days of Dark Concepts [2]
Category: VIXX
Genre: M/M, Thieves!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-07
Packaged: 2018-04-30 12:12:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5163410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meanderingmirth/pseuds/meanderingmirth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The neighbour who lives in the flat above Taekwoon seems just as mysterious as he is; while Taekwoon stores away the glittering jewels and gems he expertly pilfers from even the most heavily guarded strongholds, the neighbour above is nothing more than whispers of footsteps and the flakes of ash that drift down like dying snow, and Taekwoon can’t help but wonder just who it is that keeps the same odd hours as he does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Renaissance Man

**Author's Note:**

> Day 2 of the Dark Concept theme!
> 
> enjoy~

The first time he notices the neighbour who lives above him, Taekwoon had been putting the kettle on the stove for a mug of tea when he looked out of the window and saw little grey flakes floating serenely down. He’d frowned, wondering how winter could sweep in so quickly when October hadn’t even ended yet, until he realized that it was not snowflakes after all; it was cigarette ash from the floor above.

Curious, Taekwoon left the kettle humming on top of the heating coils and slid open his balcony door. He never kept it locked— he lived on the twelfth floor of the old, rustic building overlooking a quiet canal. Only those with exceptional climbing skills could ever hope to scale up the rusted fire escape and up along a series of drain pipes until they reached his door. Also, in the event of a quick escape, Taekwoon didn’t have time to waste opening locks.

The air was chilly when he placed his bare feet onto the grubby, reinforced concrete, but the gentle breath of wind that wafted by managed to carry the light scent of cigarette smoke down towards him. Taekwoon stood in the blind spot of his balcony, arms crossed as he sniffed the air discreetly. The smell was soft, smokey, but also a little floral, and it reminded him of the tar-reduced ladies’ cigarettes he would see the nurses smoking in the alleyway behind the local hospital whenever he walked past. Yet it was still a little different, smelled stronger than the skinny white sticks the tired women puffed on, and there was undoubtably a rather masculine scent to it all.

Taekwoon stood outside for a few more minutes, breathing slowly and watching more flakes drift down before him, until the kettle began to rattle and whistle and he had to return inside.

+

He ran a background check on his neighbours when he first moved in nearly two years ago, but only on the ones on his level. Taekwoon supposed he could hire someone to do a little digging on the person who lived above him, but it was such a waste of resource and time. Besides, some old-fashioned intel-gathering always managed to entertain him and keep him on his toes.

He got onto the lift with an old lady one afternoon, a folded-up newspaper hiding the details of his next heist tucked under an arm and a paper bag of Danish pastries in the other hand when he noticed she lived a floor above him. Spontaneously, he followed her up, and when the elevator doors cranked open, he faked a confused look before letting out a heavy sigh.

“Something wrong, my dear?” the old lady asked, pushing her little cart of groceries out of the lift after him.

“I think so,” Taekwoon said, smiling down at her. “I must be very out of it today; I’ve gotten off on the wrong floor.”

“Oh, mercy me,” the lady laughed kindly, reaching out to pat his arm. “Busy day for you?”

“Perhaps,” Taekwoon hummed, and then pointedly directed his gaze towards her bags. “Ah, let me help you with those, ma’am.”

The old lady flustered about him, trying to tell him that she could handle it, but Taekwoon pushed the cart down the carpeted hallway all the same, drawing the lady into casual conversation as he asked where she lived, and how the tenants on her floor was.

“It’s quiet up here,” she chuckled as she took his proffered elbow and walked next to him down the hall. “There’s a lovely married couple in the apartment next to mine, and there’s a rather tired old businessman in the one across the hall. Neither of them are much trouble. The young ones don’t like to stay here, you see. The building’s too old for their tastes.”

“And what about this one?” Taekwoon asked, pointing at the apartment he knew was right above his own. The old lady peered at it, and said, “Oh my, I’ve only seen the gentleman that lives here once or twice. He’s quite young too, actually, perhaps around your age.”

“Does he not come out often?” Taekwoon questioned, eyeing the brass, lion-headed door knocker mounted onto the whitewashed wooden door.

“He keeps rather odd hours, it seems,” the old lady babbled on, tiny feet in clunky red loafers shuffling next to Taekwoon’s laced-up oxfords. “Never see him come out, even for groceries! The last time I ran into him, he had a bag filled with all kinds of paints. I asked him, whatever are those all for? And he told me he was an art student working his way through his projects, and I haven’t seen him since then.”

“I see,” Taekwoon said softly, and then they were at the old lady’s apartment. He helped her bring her groceries in, and while she offered him tea and biscuits, he very nearly helped himself to some of the valuables she’d left lying around on top of the chest of drawers in the cramped living room. But a few expert glances and a feel of the weight of the gemstones against his palm told him that there was nothing worth stealing in this granny’s home; indeed, Taekwoon was fairly certain a few stones he rolled between his fingers were actually fakes.

Later, when he was walking back towards the elevator with an entire box of chocolate almond crisps along with his pastries, he stopped before the mysterious man’s door for a moment and simply surveyed it, thinking. Chances were, the occupant of this apartment was just as the old lady said: a shut-in art student from the art school slaving away at his work, but there was a little voice in the back of his mind that wouldn’t let it go, wouldn’t let Taekwoon rest without trying to decipher the man behind those doors. It was a feeling that urged him to take a closer look, one that was all too familiar for him when it came to lifting precious jewellery locked away in heavy duty safes or stealing prized gemstones from heavily guarded compounds.

And if there’s anything Taekwoon learned from his escapades, it’s to always trust his instincts.

+

He finally meets the neighbour for real one foggy night, almost a month after he initially noticed them. Taekwoon had been scouting the location of his next planned heist for weeks now, taking note of the in-and-outs of guards and tourists of the museum his prize was on display in while making notes of the kinds of security measures in place. Tonight would’ve been an ideal night for a break-in with the heavy fog as the perfect cover-up, but Taekwoon knew he was far from ready to go in.

However, that didn’t mean that others weren’t thinking along the same mindset as he was.

Taekwoon wouldn’t have noticed the figure scaling up the sides of the rusty fire escape and up the pipes if he didn’t climb up them so often himself. There was also the case where the figure was headed towards the flat above his, into the home of the elusive upper-flood neighbour Taekwoon had been thinking about at on-and-off intervals in between his work. And here they were, struggling to make it past Taekwoon’s balcony because the large, rectangular package strapped to their back seemed to get in their way for too often for a smooth trip.

Taekwoon watched the thief wrestle with their haul for a minute or so before he called up to them.

“Having trouble up there?”

The thief turned around so fast Taekwoon was certain they’d given themselves whiplash. There was no reply; they simply stared down at him, their face too far away for Taekwoon to make out any distinguishable features. He cracked an amused smile before reaching into his pockets and pulling out a pair of worn leather gloves.

Sliding them onto his hands, Taekwoon took a running leap and caught on to the lowest rung of the fire escape. He hauled himself up, slid his feet into the little gaps of the iron-wrought banisters, and climbed up to where the thief was with practiced ease, switching between the flat balconies and the spaces between the pipes, where he could wedge his fingers and toes into. His long coat caught in the breeze and it flapped stiffly like wings off his back. It was not an ideal garment to wear while climbing up a building, but then again, Taekwoon hadn’t planned on climbing anywhere tonight.

He pulled himself up next to the thief and motioned for him to take the parcel off his back. The figure, whom had a distinctly male body now that Taekwoon could see them up close, made no movement to comply.

“You won’t get anywhere like that,” Taekwoon advised, his voice soft in the stillness of the night, and the man glanced back before he lifted a hand off the pipes, slid off the straps of his package one by one, and handed it over to Taekwoon. The weight of it caught him by surprise; Taekwoon hadn’t expected the parcel to have so much density.

Now freed from his burden, the man scaled up the last portion of the pipes with a surprising burst of speed and landed with a soft  _thump_  on his balcony. He leaned over the edge, gesturing, and Taekwoon braced his legs on the sturdiest parts of the brackets before he hoisted the parcel up with a grunt. Hands reached out in the darkness and grabbed the package, and a moment later the weight was lifted from Taekwoon’s hands. He heaved a sigh, rolling his shoulder back.

For a moment he stared up at the open patio door that led into an equally dark room, and a second later, the man reappeared, leaned over the edge, and offered Taekwoon his hand.

Feeling his heart thud in his chest, Taekwoon swung his arm up and grasped the stranger’s arm, allowing them to help him up onto the balcony and inside the flat.

He found it rather ironic how his first entrance into his neighbour’s home was not through the front door.

In the darkness, Taekwoon could recognize the layout of the apartment as the same one of his own place, but where he had a maps tacked up onto the bulletin board mounted on the wall above his couch, a coffee table full of notes and badly-arranged furniture to imitate future crime scenes, this apartment had nothing but strange, similarly rectangular shapes propped up all over the fairly empty space.

The stranger walked around Taekwoon and slid the balcony door shut. He yanked the blinds closed and then reached over to flick on the light switch, bathing the room in a warm, golden glow. It was then that Taekwoon could see that the rectangular shapes were actually paintings, the lot of them in various stages of completion.

“I suppose this is where I’ll say ‘I won’t tell if you wont’,” a deep voice said from behind him, and Taekwoon turned in time to see the man pull a ski mask off his face, revealing fluffy, sweaty brown hair, an angular jawline and bright eyes that met his gaze and held it.

“What have I got to tell?” Taekwoon asked, feigning innocence. The man smirked at him and shook his head.

“You really trying to play it off after you scaled up those pipes and balconies like damn a cat? Points for effort, I suppose,” the man said. He pulled off the padded gloves on his hands as he spoke, and when he extended his palm toward Taekwoon, he was rather surprised to see just how small the man’s hands were.

“I know a fellow thief when I see one,” the man said, his gaze flickering over Taekwoon’s face critically, like he was appraising a particularly complex piece of artwork. “Since we both seem to have our own agendas at this building and we’ve co-existed peacefully before, I’m proposing that we keep things the same way, so neither of us lose any profit or identities to our friends in the justice department along the way. Sounds like a plan?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Taekwoon agreed, and slid his own gloves off to shake. The man’s hand was warm, and his grip was firm. “Might I know the name of the man I’ll hopefully not see in the papers reporting an arrest?”

“Lee Hongbin,” Hongbin replied easily, and when he smiled, he showed off two little dimples that offset the guarded image he held before. “Pleasure to meet you, mister...?”

“Jung Taekwoon,” Taekwoon answered. “If you’ll pardon my poor neighbourly etiquette for not introducing myself sooner.”

“Not at all,” Hongbin laughed, and was it any surprise that Taekwoon found the sound as intriguing as its owner at this point anymore?

+

Lee Hongbin could play the guitar, knew how to ballroom dance, could do a backflip from a standing position, and most importantly, he knew how to paint.

That itself quickly explained why he had so many paintings, many of them perfect replicas, lying around his apartment as casually as dirty socks amidst the genuine masterpieces he’d stolen.

“Where the hell am I gonna lock them up in?” Hongbin said once, when Taekwoon commented on how he kept his work open on display. “I can’t shove all my artwork into a tiny safe like your pretty rocks, the condensed paint fumes alone will be a nightmare.”

“Isn’t it risky, though, leaving everything out like this?” Taekwoon asked from where he sat in a fold-up chair in the corner of the room, drinking Hongbin’s homemade lemonade. It was sugary sweet in his mouth.

“What’s life without a little risk?” Hongbin shrugged, eyes fixed on his latest creation as his tiny brush tiptoed across the canvas, leaving behind tiny dots of mixed blues and greens. “It won’t be the first time I’ve had to abandon everything and make a break for it either.”

“Shame,” Taekwoon hummed. “To leave all that effort behind.”

“It’s all a part of this cat and mouse game,” Hongbin chuckled, slanting Taekwoon a knowing look. “Don’t tell me you’ve never dropped a prize during a getaway, rock thief.”

Taekwoon laughed at that, smoothing the long sleeves of his knitted sweater over his hands as he did. “Once,” he said. “Threw a tiny pink diamond worth millions of euros into a river under the cover of darkness. I barely made it out of the country alive.”

“Shame,” Hongbin echoed, eyes glittering with mirth, and Taekwoon pretended to scoff at him.

“Go back to your painting, you starving artist.”

“I’ve got enough saved up to live this life over a dozen times,” Hongbin shot back, brushing his bangs back from his face. The motion left a little blue smudge on his high cheekbone, and Taekwoon’s gaze traced down the cutting edge of the jawline, down the flex of the neck before it came to a rest on the muscles hidden beneath the thin layer of Hongbin’s shirt. It was no wonder he’d managed to scale up the whole building with a giant painting on his back.

“How would you live your next life then?” Taekwoon asked, setting his empty glass down on the dining table behind him. Hongbin paused mid-stroke at the question, tilting his head in thought.

“I’m not quite sure,” he said. “But I know there are some things I’d like to do again.”

“And what might those things be?”

“Flunk out of art school,” Hongbin snorted. “Saved my sense of creativity from being crushed in that stifling institute. I’d like to keep on seeing my nephews too, even if my sisters say I’m being a bad influence to them. I’ll also learn how to play the guitar, and then I’ll meet the singer who made me cry with the sound of voice alone once more, just so I can experience that once in a lifetime emotion all over again.”

“Your life sounds quite fulfilling,” Taekwoon said, quirking an eyebrow. “Are you sure you don’t want to retire from this art business and carry on with the mundane already?”

“Don’t be silly,” Hongbin smiled, leaning back in his stool to survey his work. “If I’d given up at any point in my career, I’d miss out on so much.”

“Like what?”

The look in Hongbin’s eyes was unreadable as he turned to look at Taekwoon.

“Like meeting you,” he said, and Taekwoon could feel the pulse in his neck  _skyrocket_.

+

For as long as he’s lived, Taekwoon’s always had a good eye for detail.

He could tell the value of a rock by the way it shines, could verify the legitimacy of a hunk of gemstone by the feel of it in his palms, and he could read the story etched into the scratches of old wedding rings or the reverence given to a jewelled family ornament that’s been sitting on an altar.

He can also tell from the quick, artfully subtle side-glances Hongbin steals of him from time to time that it means he’s not the only one to take an interest in their neighbour. He sensed the looks that trail down his long legs and over his broad shoulders, the lingering gaze on his narrow fingers as he turned over smooth opals and rounded pearls under a desk lamp, and felt the fleeting heat of Hongbin’s body when they brush past each other, close enough for Taekwoon to see the flutter of dark lashes, the smoothness of pale skin, and the slight curls at the end of Hongbin’s hair.

It’s funny, Taekwoon thought as he watched Hongbin smoke outside on the balcony one rainy afternoon, exhaling wisps of smoke into the ambient noise of the downpour outside. They’re both thieves, damn good ones at it, and while they had no qualms about destroying historical culture and wrecking heritage with forgeries and thieving, apparently trying to steal each other’s hearts was a boundary they were hesitant to cross.

The thing was, Taekwoon was ready for his heist. When the whole operation had finished undergoing strict calculations and had every worst-case scenario mapped out, there was one thing he’d wanted to do once he got away with the gems in the museum. It was tying up a loose end, so to speak, but right now, as he stared at Hongbin tapping the cigarette against the railing with a faraway expression on his face, Taekwoon wondered if he’d had to revise that plan.

“Hongbin,” he called, and Hongbin turned, looking at him through the open balcony door.

“Yes?” the forger said, and Taekwoon beckoned him inside. Hongbin quirked a little smile but chucked the cigarette away into the rain all the same. He padded across the damp balcony, wiped his bare, wet feet on the little mat by the entranceway, and gave Taekwoon an expectant look as he neared.

“What is it?”

Taekwoon cleared his throat unnecessarily before he spoke. “I’m leaving,” he said. “I’m leaving the city after my heist.”

He saw Hongbin twitch a little in surprise, watched a shadow pass over the other man’s face before it smoothed into a mildly interested expression.

“Where will you go?” Hongbin asked, tone nonchalant.

“I want you to come with me,” Taekwoon said instead of answering, and Hongbin couldn’t quite hide his astonishment at  _that_.

“Go with you?”

Taekwoon nodded, his throat tight. He’d never felt nerves like this before, not even when breaking into a state-of-the-art alarmed vault for the first time in his life.

“I’ve been living here for the past two years. That’s quite a long time in our line of work, and the longer I stay, the riskier it’ll become.”

“Don’t you think two people together would be equally risky?” Hongbin asked. He moved until he was standing in front of Taekwoon, chin tilted up at a slight angle so he could maintain eye contact. There was a playful glint in the dark brown irises. “And what makes you think I want to go with you when I’ve already staked out here?”

“You really trying to play it off?” Taekwoon said, echoing the words from their first meeting. He stepped forwards, catching Hongbin’s chin with his hand before the other could move away. “Points for effort, but you’re not as subtle as you think you are.”

Hongbin grinned, showing off a row of pearly white teeth. “That’s gonna be a pretty big problem for a thief,” he said lowly, allowing Taekwoon to tip his head back even further. Their lips were barely brushing against each other’s, tantalizingly,  _painfully_  close. “I’d hate to get caught and locked up.”

“Me too,” Taekwoon breathed, thumb and index finger tightening on Hongbin’s jaw, and that apparently had been the last straw, because Hongbin was surging forwards next, smashing his mouth against Taekwoon’s.

Taekwoon staggered back, hands holding Hongbin’s face in place as he kissed back without any reservations. He felt palms clutch the back of his cardigan and slide downwards and boldly grab his ass. He felt Hongbin’s smile into the kiss as he let out a disgruntled noise and pushed them away from the open kitchen, past the living room, and towards Hongbin’s bedroom. The forger’s private quarters was even sparser than Taekwoon’s: the single mattress sat under the window in the back of an empty room, surrounded by miscellaneous objects, folded clothes, and old art encyclopedias.

They crumpled onto it, stripping off their clothes in a haste. Hongbin was warm, so warm against Taekwoon on that rainy afternoon when Taekwoon held Hongbin’s wrists above his head and fucked him into the mattress, face pressed into the crook of Hongbin’s neck as Hongbin thrashed and moaned below him. They rolled over afterwards, and that was when Hongbin decided it might be a good time to ride Taekwoon instead, a lazy smirk on his face as he scratched his nails gently down Taekwoon’s chest and urged him with heavy, heady whispers to grip his waist  _harder_ , to go  _faster_.

It was late in the evening when Hongbin reached up and cracked open the grimy window before lighting up another cigarette. The familiar scent of something vaguely floral filled the small space as Hongbin smoked it down to the filter, giving Taekwoon soft, fond kisses between drags.

“Where will you take me?” Hongbin asked when he finally flicked the butt out the window. He slunk back down under the blankets and leaned into Taekwoon’s hand when Taekwoon started to comb his fingers through Hongbin’s messy, tangled hair.

“Not the city,” Taekwoon decided as he stared up at the plain ceiling of Hongbin’s room, wondering what Hongbin might paint on the white emptiness if he had the time to do so. “Some fresh air in the countryside might do us both some good, no?”

“Hmm,” Hongbin hummed, closing his eyes as he smiled at some unseen image of rolling hills, cottages with a trail of smoke rising out of the chimney, and vast, open land. “Countryside. Rural aesthetics. I could live with that.”

“We’ll return to the busy streets when we find something else worth stealing,” Taekwoon promised. He was certain his heart was swelling with a kind of tranquil happiness. “One day.”

“One day,” Hongbin agreed, and laid his head down on Taekwoon’s chest. “I’ll look forwards to it.”

+

A month later, the headlines of the local paper were emblazoned with the announcement of a shocking break-in at the museum and the senseless loss of the city’s prized gemstone display.

A few pages in, two inconspicuous ads for recently leased out apartments could only be found if one knew the kind of subtlety they were looking for in between the bigger news and the bolder ink.

**Author's Note:**

> this one is probably the least dark out of all the stories, but I still had a lot of fun trying to imagine this little city with wet pavement and old buildings and sneaky thieves running around at night O v O
> 
> thanks for reading!


End file.
